I think a community wiki on problems (and solutions) when installing Ubuntu (10.10) on a Thinkpad Edge 11 would be nice (because I just got one ;)). I'll contribute with my own problems and solutions, and hope others will join too.

Fan is loud, even though it's on auto. No solution. Thinkfan is a possible solution, but correction values for sensors should be supplied (mapping sensors to specific areas). Also, one sensor is between -100C and +100C - maybe some kind of deactivation would help.

There are either too many possible answers, or good answers would be too long for this format. Please add details to narrow the answer set or to isolate an issue that can be answered in a few paragraphs.
If this question can be reworded to fit the rules in the help center, please edit the question.

Here's a step-by-step explanation of how to install the Realtek driver:

Download the driver from this page. The relevant section is "RTL8192CE-VA4"

sudo apt-get install build-essentials linux-source

cd /usr/src && sudo tar xfjv linux-source-2.6.35.tar.bz2

unpack the driver source and change to the directory contained

make

sudo su

make install

Against expectations, the last two steps cannot be replaced by a simple sudo make install because that fails with reference to a missing kernel/bounds.c.

The driver work well enough for me on Ubuntu 10.10.

UPDATE: Now there is a PPA (of which many thanks to the creator) which makes this much easier. It also has the important advantage that the driver persists through kernel upgrades. This works for maverick. Instead of the above, type:

The FN Keys stop working

After working fine for a few months, the special "FN" keys on my Thinkpad Edge 13 - brightness, volume control, mute - suddenly stopped working. The problems seems to occur in Windows as well as in Linux. As it appears, this is a defect that can be resolved by installing a BIOS update. This thread shows you how to do it. Be sure to download the right boot CD image. As to why such a problem makes its appearance after working fine for months, only Lenovo engineers will know. On the plus side, the upgrade is quite easy, provided that you own a USB CD drive/writer.

This defect is reported to occur on Edge 13, Edge 14 and Edge 15 machines.

UPDATE: For many the trouble reappears some time after the BIOS update. The difficulty also seems to affect the lid close event. As a temporary fix, disconnect the A/C and remove the battery for a minute. The problem appears to be one of hardware/firmware rather than Linux. See this thread for more information.

Oh, I have a problem. My CD isn't working and Lenovo doesn't read my USB as a bootable CD (used dd to write the iso). Any ideas how can I update the bios without a CD?
–
AlikElzin-kilakaJul 22 '12 at 21:21

1

Try simply disconnecting the AC and removing the battery to get back the ACPI functionality.
–
loevborgJul 26 '12 at 15:03

No sound on headphones

AMD II Neo Dual-Core K325, 10.10 Netbook edition

I had no sound on my headphones and the built-in speakers were still playing sound with headphones plugged in. I followed the instruction from the first post at http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1043568, with the following option line in alsa-base.conf:

options snd-hda-intel model="ideapad"

After a reboot, the headphones worked and built-in speakers were turned off with headphones present. I am not sure that the option I used is optimal - it just did what I wanted.